Stagger Lee

1930 - 1950

1931. Cab Calloway records "Stack O’Lee Blues." He has been playing at the Cotton Club for a year and is broadcasting NBC radio shows from there twice weekly. We do know yet if "Stack O’Lee Blues" is included in one of the broadcasts. Cab Calloway and his Cotton Club Orchestra are the first African American Jazz Orchestra to tour the south.

1931. Woody Guthrie records two versions, "Stagger Lee" and "Stack-O-Lee." He sings versions of the song for decades.

John Hurt sang:

Standin’ on the gallows,
Head way up high
At 12 o’clock they killed him,
They was all glad to see him die
That bad man, Oh cruel Stack O’Lee.

Woody Guthrie sings:

Stackolee on his gallows,
His head way up high
12 o’clock we killed him,
We was all glad to see him die
He was a bad man, That mean old Stackolee.

Black singers commonly sing variations on "They was all glad to see him die." White singers commonly sing variations on "We was all glad to see him die." There are continual subtle variations between black and white performances of this song.

1933+ Field recordings of the song are made for the Library of Congress as various collectors such as John and Alan Lomax tour the country recording folk music.